Vladimir Estrogen 🏳️‍⚧️ 🏳️‍🌈

"Your Uber driver was the Head of Cancer Research at Vanderbilt last month."

Promises made, promises kept. Our limited edition “STAND UP FOR TRANS KIDS” union-printed merch is here!

We’re only making this one batch so get yours before they sell out: www.rayguncustom.com/collections/...

I don't say he's a great man. Mark Cuban made a lot of money. Mark Cuban is not the finest character that ever lived. But he’s a billionaire, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid. Attention, attention must finally be paid to such a person.

Medicare for All is insurance.

The Medicare for All Act says, "This bill establishes a national health insurance program that is administered by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)."

www.congress.gov/bill/117th-c...

That's why I'm saying that if we want to provide gender-affirming care without requiring a diagnosis, then we'd need much more radical changes to our model of health-care delivery than just changing the payer and adopting Medicare for All.

The issue isn't private vs. public insurance. Even with Medicare for all, Medicare also bases access to care on diagnoses. So does every country that has universal health care.

So even with Medicare for All, you'd still need a diagnosis to get gender-affirming care (HRT, surgery, etc.).

It's not about preventing fraud. It's about both private insurance companies and public health care programs are always looking for excuses not to cover medical care in order to save money.

And gender-affirming care is really politically unpopular these days, so it's especially vulnerable.

A lot of anti-trans politicians in many countries would love to say, "See! Gender dysphoria isn't real, so no one needs gender-affirming medical care, and we don't need to pay for it from public funds or require private insurers to cover it."

I would love to be wrong on this, but this is my fear.

So it seems important to ask what the implications eliminating gender dysphoria as a diagnosable disorder would be for people being able to get the care they need.

Especially in a political climate where politicians in many countries are trying to cut back on paying for all sorts of medical care.

You know and I know that people don't transition frivolously, but the whole system of paying for care in the US and most other countries is based on diagnostic codes.

It's easy to say fuck health insurance if you can afford to self-pay.

But care can be expensive, especially surgical care, so even if the care isn't blocked by law or medical policy, it's effectively blocked if a person can't afford it and insurance won't cover it.

What model of medical care would require insurance to pay for gender-affirming care without a diagnosis that the person has a harmful disorder that requires treatment?

I'm interested in what an alternate model might look like.

Today, insurance pays for medical procedures only if they treat or prevent diagnosable disorders (mental or physical). Without a diagnosis, insurance won't pay (e.g., Botox, rhinoplasty, etc. when they're categorized as cosmetic).

So I agree with what you write here, but this is a very different view than the one I was responding to up-thread, that revolution would be an immediate and direct response to a mass shooting by ICE.

Rather, the revolution/New Deal became possible because a movement built gradually over time, and response to atrocities was one of many tributary streams feeding this response. New Deal didn't begin to happen for almost 20 years after Ludlow and Matewan, so any connection was indirect and delayed.

What I take away is consistent with where I was coming from in saying that a mass shooting by ICE was unlikely to be the trigger for a revolution:

What you are saying here is that response to atrocities fed into the larger revolutionary movement, but did not directly trigger a revolution. ...

This is great. Thank you for replying with so much detail and good information.

This may be a fine distinction, but I see FDR's ability to push the new deal through as something that resulted far more from labor's strength than from a reaction to atrocities committed by government and capital.

If that were true, the revolution would have happened over 100 years ago, in response to things like the Matewan massacre or the Ludlow massacre.

Two things:

1. Historically, terrorizing the public doesn't always lead to revolution. Often, it succeeds at suppressing dissent.

2. When people believe that state atrocities will result in revolution, some people are tempted to provoke atrocities without concern for those who will be killed.

I really hope you didn't intend that as accelerationist bullshit.

They're poorly trained, armed, and humiliated.

I fear that this combination is like dry tinder for losing it and opening fire on civilians.

Just sit with this for a moment. Israel perpetrated what is certainly the largest single mass killing of trans people in history. And it's basically a footnote in an article in the NYT covered weeks after it happened.

Is the New York Times trying to wreck Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral bid? | Margaret Sullivan With their made-up scandal, combined with the pre-election editorial, the Times looks like it’s on a crusade against Mamdani

I love that former NYT public editor @sulliview.bsky.social is public-editing from the outside.

"With this made-up scandal, combined with the pre-election editorial, the Times looks like it’s on a crusade against Mamdani.

"And no lofty explanation about the mission can disguise it."

The Blogs: We are NYC rabbis who support Zohran Mamdani – Here’s why His platform reflects the Jewish call for justice and also offers a clear plan to address antisemitic violence. That's what real protection looks like

Solidarity ✊

Everything that's happening here with the public response to secret police disappearing people is alarmingly and hauntingly similar to exactly what Paul Lynch imagined in his 2023 novel, _Prophet Song_.

Right. This is why the headline read, "Mamdani once claimed to be African-American" instead of, "Many Struggle to Fit their Identities into Simplistic Categories."

Bannon yelled at Donald's daughter
Elon left with Miller's gal

Oh the billionaire and the podcaster should be friends
The billionaire and the podcaster should be friends
One of them likes big trade wars
The other wants to go to Mars
But that's no reason why they can't be friends

White supremacists should stick together
White supremacists should all be pals
...

If billionaires really cared about "everyone should have the stuff billionaires have," they could share their stuff with everyone. Easy-peasy.